It is freedom if you have developed others on the way, Loneliness if you stepped on others to achieve it
I am not sure what your definition of success is? Regardless of how you define success, if your focus has been and continue to be you and you alone, you will find, if not already discovered that this was a very wrong approach. If success is achieved by stepping on others to reach it, if you treated others as your stepping stool to climb the ladder of success you are a very lonely and miserable human being and you are constantly worried about when the rug will be pulled from under you. You see none of the people you stepped on the get to the top are there to help you sustain it, in fact I am willing to bet that they are actively maybe not overtly but actively pursuing efforts to undermine you and bring you to your knees. As John Maxwell has famously said, “If you find yourself at the top of the mountain all alone, you were not a leader, you were just a hiker, and my suggestion is you get down from the mountain as fast as you can”
Success has been, is, and always will be an effort to make those who are willing to follow you better than you ever hoped to be yourself, it is only when you focus on other’s success and well being, the doors to your success and achievement are opened, remember that always.
There is no such thing as a solitary life, even the act of creating you required the cooperation, immense love and sacrifice of at least two other humans. The nature of your existence is cooperation and sacrifice, without the cooperation of so many other lifeforms, visible and invisible you will not be able to breathe a single breath, but we forget this fact, due to our false assumption that we humans are the center of the universe, this arrogance and stupidity is and has been the most destructive assumption to our existence.
If you truly want to succeed in any endeavor, become a servant at heart, not begrudgingly but willingly, and also understand that to truly serve is never to expect a payback. If your thought is that I will serve so I can get what I want, that my friend is trading not serving. By giving and serving unconditionally, you create an imbalance and vacuum, both of these conditions are abhorrent to nature and they can not last. And when that imbalance is corrected it is never one for one, just like a seed which when planted in proper soil produces not one but thousands upon thousands of fruits, so too nature rewards in abundance and prosperity because that is nature — abundant and prosperous.
Be the sower of seeds, make your field humanity, make the seeds unconditional love and service, your life can not be but successful.